Chapter 18
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : Come to think of it, Bin, did you sign up for the festival?]
After finishing an otherwise unremarkably boring school day, Hyeona was practicing piano when a KakaoTalk message came flying in. The message she checked without thinking contained something she couldn’t simply brush aside.
[Jeong Hyeona : What festival sign-up]
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : Weren’t you supposed to perform at your school festival?]
[Jeong Hyeona : ???]
[Jeong Hyeona : We were??]
[Jeong Hyeona : No, I don’t really remember]
[Jeong Hyeona : Waitwaitwait]
Hyeona recalled something that had happened recently.
After their first ensemble, Suyeon had said something about needing to decide on a direction, or something like that.
What had she said then? Uh… Hyeona vaguely remembered that she had probably agreed. But after thinking it over once she got home, she’d decided it really wasn’t for her, so she hadn’t brought it up again.
[Jeong Hyeona : Ohthat]
[Jeong Hyeona : Wasn’t our festival not confirmed yet??]
[Jeong Hyeona : I think they said it hadn’t been decided yet]
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : But you seemed to like it]
[Jeong Hyeona : I do, but;]
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : Why?]
Hyeona thought for a moment about how to put the feelings she was experiencing into words. There was this subtle feeling… How should she put it? She wanted to do it, but at the same time didn’t want to…
[Jeong Hyeona : I guess you could say it feels kind of complicated]
Then, as she began typing a long message on KakaoTalk to describe her feelings more fully, Hyeona deleted it all. Rather than describing every detail of those feelings, getting the other person to empathize, and then trying to persuade them with that, it was more convenient to give a reasonable explanation.
[Jeong Hyeona : We’ve only practiced otaku songs so far, so doesn’t that mean we’d perform otaku songs at the festival?]
The biggest reason she was reluctant to perform at the school festival.
It wasn’t that she was being bullied at school with people going, “Eww, that otaku,” or anything. She wasn’t being ostracized by an otaku group, either.
But that didn’t mean she had lots of friends or anything, either. Hyeona’s life amounted to being one student who slept face-down during class, existing almost invisibly and known only as, “I heard she wants to go to an arts college!”
So performing with a band at her own school festival was not something Hyeona was eager to do. Wouldn’t that draw attention?
Once she attracted attention, annoying things would inevitably follow. Since these were songs from a popular anime, some kids would recognize them, come over saying, “I like that one too~,” and latch on, while others would look down on her and say, “Wow, she was a total hardcore otaku.” In every respect, her school life would surely become very different from now.
During the emotionally sensitive teenage years, the reality was that even experiencing class-wide public humiliation could make someone hate life and become depressed. If there was a chance she might be subjected to it on a school-wide scale, rather than thinking, “How can I avoid being teased after performing?” it would be better simply not to perform at all.
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : What does that have to do with anything]
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : Just do it]
Seoha, of course, had no understanding of that mindset at all. If you liked something, why not just do it? What was the problem?
Among the concerts she had attended a few times with various friends and acquaintances, there had been plenty of people playing that kind of “otaku music,” and every one of them had seemed to be having fun.
“Isn’t it kind of weird to worry about stuff like that?”
“Huh?”
“Oh, no.”
Seoha’s offhand mutter drew a response from the church deacon cleaning the rehearsal room. Seoha shook her head and, mindful of the deacon’s presence, continued fidgeting with her phone.
[Jeong Hyeona : I’m telling you it’s like that]
[Horang|Yoo Seoha : Like what]
[Jeong Hyeona : Besides, it’s not even something I can decide on my own, and there’s only a month and a half left. How am I supposed to do this]
“…I’d like to do it, though.”
Hyeona muttered.
Didn’t everyone have thoughts like that every once in a while? For example, suppose aliens suddenly invaded but said they’d spare you if you could clear a rhythm game’s highest-level song with an SS grade—you’d clear it perfectly, save Earth, and earn the world’s praise.
Even without such absurd fantasies, everyone was starved for recognition as a child. Wanting to be acknowledged for something you were doing, or for a hobby that could give you confidence, was something everyone thought about at least once.
Hyeona was an ordinary South Korean teenager too, so she had occasionally thought, I want to be recognized in front of everyone someday!! Whether for piano or for her otaku hobbies.
But this particular form of it was a little… She felt like she needed to prepare herself mentally.
Anyway, it was embarrassing.
* * *
Myeongjeon entered the café with Iseo. Hyeona and Seoha were seated at a table in the corner.
‘I wonder what this is about today.’
Seoha’s KakaoTalk message had arrived out of nowhere during class: “I think there’s something we need to decide today. Would you be able to meet this evening?” Was there really something they needed to decide? Even so, Myeongjeon had brought Iseo to the café.
They exchanged brief greetings and sat at the table. Seoha’s expression looked as though she had nothing in particular on her mind, whereas Hyeona seemed oddly hesitant.
“What was it you wanted to see us about today?”
“There’s something we need to decide, but I don’t think we’ve decided it yet.”
“What is it?”
“The band name.”
At that, Iseo let out an admiring “Ah~!” Come to think of it, she was right. There was nothing more important to a band than its name, and they hadn’t chosen one.
“That is a serious problem. So, have you thought of anything?”
“Uh… Not particularly.”
Hmm. Myeongjeon folded their arms. A good band name… They had a few pieces of advice regarding band names, and Myeongjeon offered one of them.
“In any case, it’s easier to choose one in English.”
“Huh? Why?”
“Just because even if you come up with something more or less meaningless, writing it in English makes it look like it has some depth. For example, ‘Rolling Stones’ looks cool, right? But if the band’s name were ‘Rocks Roll,’ what would be cool about that? The Beatles is the same. If it were called ‘The Beetles,’ everyone would go, ‘Hmm…’”
There were endless other examples. Take AC/DC. What’s cool about “Alternating Current/Direct Current”? And The Yardbirds? Cream? Animals? The Beach Boys? Translated into Korean, they were all names that sounded completely lame.
What about Korean band names? Songgolmae, Deulgukhwa, Infinite Orbit, Cho Yong-pil and the Great Birth, and so on. Can you imagine how hard they must have racked their brains to come up with cool band names?
“No, I don’t think we need to take it that far. Don’t you? Names like the Kessoku Band are fine, too. Or After School Tea Time…”
“Are those really considered good?”
I don’t really understand young people’s sensibilities. Myeongjeon tilted their head slightly.
“It might be hard to decide right away. Nothing particularly distinctive is coming to mind.”
At that, Iseo, who had been muttering, “Cable Tie or something…,” mimed zipping her lips shut. Cable Tie? What on earth had inspired that band name?
“And the second thing we need to decide is, when will our first performance be?”
“I don’t know… We haven’t decided anything in particular.”
Myeongjeon lightly tapped the table, then spoke again.
“Didn’t you say Hyeona’s school festival was at the end of December? I think we could do it then.”
“Right?”
Seoha nodded as if she had expected that answer, while Iseo smiled faintly, apparently pleased.
“Um…”
But the person in question, Hyeona, did not look very happy. Was she reluctant, or was there some other circumstance? As Myeongjeon remembered it, Hyeona had seemed quite pleased when they had suggested performing at her school festival.
“I’m kind of… not sure about that.”
“Why?”
“Well, I guess you could say I’m a little embarrassed. Performing in front of other people is, you know… The first song we’re practicing is an anime insert song, right? And it has Japanese lyrics.”
“Yes.”
“I guess you could say I’m a little embarrassed about it. I don’t really want to play something this… otaku-ish in front of other people…”
“Why are you embarrassed about that?”
Hyeona muttered as if she wanted to burrow into the ground. Iseo cut her off at once, looking genuinely puzzled.
“No, if you like it, you should just do it. Why should what other people think matter?”
“Of course it matters…! Iseo-nim… You’re an extrovert with lots of friends, so you wouldn’t understand. An outcast like me has to read the room and adjust how she acts just to survive high school.”
“…?”
Myeongjeon was genuinely puzzled. Survive by reading the room? Did the buzz-cut members of the student guidance committee still go around enforcing discipline these days?
“What are you talking about? Why do you need to survive? You just go to school. What’s there to survive…”
At Iseo’s words, Hyeona slapped the table and began to intone.
“Everyone here is a popular kid, so you can’t understand what I’m saying. When you go to school, people you know greet you, you have someone to eat lunch with, and you have friends you can hang out with whenever you’re bored.
People like me have a hard time with that. I have to worry about how I look even eating lunch, even going to the bathroom. I have no presence, so I hear things like, ‘Was there someone like that in our class?’ Sometimes kids come over and pick a fight for no reason, saying, ‘Hey, are you the one who plays piano? Could you play the piano for us?’
If I played a Kessoku Band song at the school festival, starting the very next day I’d hear things like, ‘Hey, was she the one who played a Japanese song at the festival?’, ‘Wow, hehehe, she was a total hardcore otaku~,’ and ‘Otaku are disgusting.’”
Hyeona launched into an impassioned speech based on her own experience. Her feelings seemed so real that Iseo and Myeongjeon were almost overwhelmed.
“When I saw you in middle school, all you did was sleep at school. So of course you had no friends or presence.”
But Seoha cut in with a timely objection.
“Isn’t that a little paranoid?”
“I’m telling you, that’s really how it is!”
When Iseo muttered after hearing that, Hyeona let out a shriek.
“So, then… In December, at Hyeona’s school festival, you don’t want to perform a band show?”
Watching them, Myeongjeon lightly twirled a lock of hair before asking a question.